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Everything posted by Chris Bristow
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Ron, I think the tree in question was an evergreen but for whatever reason that single Branch was yellow. it's visible in several photographs but I'm going to have to look for one of them. It is not one of the trees right next to the fence.
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Robin Unger's clear GIF's of the Bell film seem to show exhaust clouds from the back of the limo and more so from the back of the follow up limo as they approach and disappear into the shadow of the overpass. The follow up car shows large plumes on either side of it just as it moves into the shadow. It would make sense that a witness looking down at the street might not see smoke on the knoll if it only lasted for a moment. Mr Johnson did not see the knoll smoke and stated "Maybe it's because they were looking that way, and I was looking down on the car." A pretty sound conclusion. I don't know about the bikes putting out smoke as neither, Hargis, Martin, Chaney or Jackson laid on the throttle. Some claim when Heygood dropped his bike smoke clouds came up. I think the Couch film proves that wrong. In addition Heygood did not drop his bike until at least 40 seconds after frame 313. If the 2 limo's smoked as they went under the triple they must have put out smoke when they initially punched it.
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They are credible, imo. But the Wiegman image of the 'smoke' has it 40ft from the theorized shooter location on the knoll fence. I have heard Tink Thompson say the shooter was only 8 ft west of the corner, in that case the smoke traveled over 30 ft. It sounds impossible. There was a wind that generally is thought to have been moving north to northeast. If we stretch that and consider a gust may have blown directly east at that moment it would have pushed the smoke further. But it would have to stay together as it was pushed 20 to 30 ft. When Zapruder filmed the knoll fence it was almost simultaneous with the Wiegman frame. In Z's film the trees are moving all over the place like trees do in a blustery wind but they look to me as if the wind was northeast. To see the trees you have to increase the exposure on the last 20 frames or so. If we are to believe it is smoke in the image then after the gun was fired and the discharge sent the smoke maybe 10 ft, the puff went another 20 to 30 ft on the wind. Holland, who looked right at the smoke would have seen it move at about 4mph over the next 8 seconds until it lined up just below the TSB entrance. According to the witnesses the smoke lingered for a few seconds but no one reported it moving away. The popular explanation that we are seeing the yellowed leaves on a branch of the tree behind the 'smoke' is probably the best answer. Other photos confirm that particular branch had turned yellow.
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Sounds like a simple lack of logic to me.
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You Find the Damndest Things on Etsy
Chris Bristow replied to Lori Spencer's topic in JFK Assassination Debate
Kellerman said the last two shots came in as a flurry while the Times "Hail of bullets" should mean all the shots. Kellerman also mentioned this flurry happened just as the limo started to accelerate. -
Most consider the Wiegman image of 'smoke' to be an illusion created by yellowed leaves, but people still debate it. If it was smoke it had to travel almost 40 ft along the trajectory from the fence toward JFK. It could never travel that far even if the wind had been behind it, Which it wasn't. People can argue aspects of the Wiegman smoke theory but 40 ft of travel should absolutely end that debate. Modern gunpowder is smokeless! That is what they say but we still see some smoke now and then. I had wondered if a freshly cleaned gun may smoke more on the 1st shot as it burns off the gun oil. I hit the jackpot on Youtube with this video of these two guys testing a very heavily oiled rifle. They explain that they used way too much oil to see what would happen. There was so much smoke generated that the old smokeless gunpowder argument is made irrelevant . It simply could have been a moderately over lubed gun on it's first shot. I also wonder if that thick, oily and heavy looking smoke would have lingered longer?
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I could accept that three evenly spaced shots came from the sixth floor. But I wonder how well Harold Norman would percieve a fourth shot coming from over 300 ft away and right on the heels of the third shot? You could stand 10 ft behind a person firing a rifle and if you forget to put on your ear protection you will know it instantly. I wonder if his ears were ringing afterwards?
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Thanks for the GIF. The possibility that these are reflections is very speculative and I'm not sold on the idea. I am trying to understand that unreal looking hat flip centered at 228. J.C definitely raises his hand some but the white blob in 228 gives the sequence the very fast flipping motion. Jackie's right elbow in 228 shows her forearm to be almost level. The white blob is where her right gloved hand should be. I have to wonder if that blob is not her right hand. Her right hand in the MPI frame 239(Bottom right) makes for a good comparison of the light coming off her glove. It matches the color of the white blob in 228 well, but the blob in 226 looks very similar too, and it is definitely not her glove. In 228 J.C's right shoulder appears to be visible through the white blob. But it could be a fast hat movement that allowed the shoulder to be visible in the first part of the shutter open time then covered the shoulder for the last half of the shutter time. That creates an image of both the hat reflection and the shoulder to lay over each other making it look like the shoulder is visible behind the blob of light. Another problem with the reflections idea is they only appear in those few frames.
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Connally's hat juggling between 224 and 230 looks strange, almost as if it was sped up. I'm not saying it is fake but I think what we see in that 3rd of a second includes reflections off of the side window. I believe there are 3 bright white reflections occurring in frames 226, 228 and 229. They create a false impression of the movement of Connally's Stetson. I'm am trying to stuff everything into one graphic so it may seem crowded. The top 6 frames(224/230 minus the blurry 227) attempt to identify the hat, hand, sleeve cuff and the 3 reflections. The bottom 3 frames are close ups of the possible reflections in 226,228, and 229. Identifying the hat in 224 and 225 is guesswork. By 226 I think a slightly elongated/blurred hat is visible. On the right side of the hat and extending above is, imo, a reflection off the window. His hat appears too low to have Sunlight bouncing off it. If it is a window reflection it is only partially obscuring the hat and the hat is visible through the reflection. In that frame there is also a bright reflection coming off the front vertical window frame at the bottom where the reflection on the glass meets it. If the location of the hat is correct then the oddly shaped bright image above the hat would also be a reflection. Frame 228 shows a round reflection at the top of Connally's left shoulder. The 228 image at the bottom of the graphic has an insert from another frame for comparison of his left shoulder. In 228 his left shoulder appears to be visible. But if the round white image is his hat it should block our view of his shoulder. But there is also what looks like a dark artifact over Connally's jaw that lines up with the top of the left shoulder. The raised left shoulder might just an artifact too. Then his startled reaction and sudden lift of the left shoulder may be exaggerated. What we see just below the raised shoulder might be the real image of the shoulder which we should not see if the hat is there. Frame 229 shows his cuff and hand and confirms the hat is at the same location as previous frames. Frame 230 confirms the general hat position also. The last reflection is in 229. The triangle shape it somewhat transparent and seems to show what is behind it. It looks as if the lower part sits over the hat and the point extends above it. If those are reflections they create the illusion that the hat was raised up much more than it actually moved. It may have barley moved from the position we see in frame 230. If those are reflections they are coming from the area near the loading dock entrance on the west side of the TSB. Possibly from the sky above it as the side windows are curved and point upwards.
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I would do that but it drives me crazy to have to keep scrolling left and right because the magnified text doesn't fit on the screen. It seems most of us here are getting pretty old. It used to be that the best advice for macular degeneration was to flood the reading material with as much light as possible. I wonder if increasing the brightness of the screen would give similar or less benefits.
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Something I've never considered before is maybe a shot from the West could bounce off the TSB and cause people to think a shot came from there. Just as an example regarding the timing, if two shots were fired from the TSB and the Knoll simultaneously most would hear about a quarter of a second delay. Someone at Teague's position would hear the biggest delay while people standing a little east of the Stemmons sign would hear the two shots as one. When I hear a Sonic rifle crack it sounds like it lasts at least a quarter of a second. Since the bullet is cracking the whole time it travels maybe what we hear is several cracks together. If the sound lasts a quarter of a second then a quarter second delay would probably not even be noticed and it would be heard as a single shot. There are so many variables to the ear Witness accounts that it is a bit surprising that we mostly have just two locations reported.
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If the last two shots were almost simultaneous as Greer and others said I would expect some witnesses to hear those two shots as one. But if the shots were evenly spaced should we expect many witnesses to mistakenly hear them as very close together? The first possibility seems unavoidable but I don't know how people would mistake two shots that are 5 seconds apart as being almost simultaneous. I don't think echoes could be an explanation as the first shot was heard by virtually everyone as a single lone shot. If echos had been an issue I would think most people would have reported closer to 6 shots. The few that did report echos knew they were echos and reported them as such. Greer and Kellerman could hear the shots zinging into the limo as well as any sonic crack or muzzle blast. As an example Kellerman said he heard the shot come in and hit JFK's head with a thump. I think they are especially qualified witnesses because they were so close to JFK, because they are trained with weapons and because their job is to recognize threats like gunfire and react. There are too many witnesses hearing the last two shots as close together and imo no way to explain it.
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Basic facts that seem like conspiracy-killers to me
Chris Bristow replied to a topic in JFK Assassination Debate
For me the compelling evidence of a conspiracy surrounds the Parkland testimonies and multiple corroborating stories from the autopsy of the large hole in the occipital parietal. That conspiracy involves a second gunman and a cover-up but still allows for Oswald to be the shooter from the 6th floor. Or possibly Oswald's suspicious activity was due to his being complicit in an assassination plot as the inside man who helped with the plot. I don't know and it doesn't matter how Oswald was involved. The possible conspiracy of a second gunman and a cover-up of the injuries does not have to involve Oswald directly. -
The Assassination Films: The Bell Film
Chris Bristow replied to Gil Jesus's topic in JFK Assassination Debate
About 60 seconds into the Bell film the first people are seen running toward the knoll as press car 1# stopped and press car 2# went around it. It happened 1:10 sec after the head shot. The people running towards the knoll are not in the street yet and there is no one on the stairs. After press car 2# went around Press car 1# it was followed by 5 more cars spaced apart by 3 to 4 seconds then followed by the first bus. There was no time for anyone to cross Elm till after the cars and bus passed. Their first opportunity to cross Elm happened 1:35 seconds after the head shot. It looks like those people were anxious to get across the road as they were mostly running that way. I think it is safe to assume they crossed as soon as they could which was right after Bus 1# passed. They would have been climbing the steps approx 1:45 seconds after Z frame 313. -
I would agree the wrist was likely hit with a different bullet. Trying to place the dorsal side of the wrist up near the exit seems highly implausible. It is possible to hold the arm lower and several inches out from the chest and be in a position to catch the bullet without having to rotate the arm too much. The lower your arm is and the farther from the exit wound it is the more it has to deflect to get to the thigh. Maybe a tumbling bullet would deflect that much after breaking a solid bone like the radius. The SBT requires a lot of deflection for a bullet in such good condition and even with a lot of deflection JC would have to have his left leg pulled quite a ways to the right. I think one problem is he is barely starting his turnaround at frame 223 with his torso turned only 20 or 30° at that point. I don't see a natural way to do the turn without moving the upper torso first and then pulling the lower torso around with it. So I think around frame 223 is lower torso would still be facing forward.
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Yes I think deflection has to be part of the scenario for the bullet to find its way to the thigh. JC was sitting in a very low seat so his knees were elevated a bit which makes the turn even more Awkward. I can't see his arm around frame 223 but his right shoulder does seem to dip down possibly as a result of the strike to the arm. His exit wound is elongated and shows the bullet was tumbling by the time it exited. A tumbling bullet that hits the radius bone directly enough to break the bone in two is likely to deflect in its path.
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If we could just see Connally's arm and left leg in the Z film this thing would be a lot easier to figure out. I also wonder exactly where his hat was and why the bullet didn't pass through that on the way to his thigh. Considering the 28° downward angle through Connally's chest there is a placement of the forearm that may work. That would be the entry wound on the forearm being about three to four inches below the nipple and about six inches out from the body. keeping the elbow near the body the forearm would angle outwards from the Torso. Then if the wrist was rotated with the dorsal side towards the exit wound under the nipple it would line up pretty well. In that position I can rotate my forearm about 25°. That's pretty close to matching the 28° downward trajectory so the Bullet would enter the top and exit the bottom of my wrist / forearm. The farther you position the forearm from the Torso the sharper the turn the bullet has to make to leave the forearm and reach the left thigh. In addition the entry and exit on his torso suggest the bullet had to deflect to the right as it passed through him. With his torso turned at least 20° to the right, as seen in the Z film, the direction of the bullet as it left his torso would be heading slightly outboard towards the right side of the limo. He would really have to bring his left leg over a long way or have a very great deflection of the bullet through the wrist for that to work.
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Connally Doc: Governor's Reaction Was Not "Delayed"
Chris Bristow replied to Gil Jesus's topic in JFK Assassination Debate
A shot from the south knoll is blocked by the windshield from fr 250 to 300. The south colonnade may work when he was in the middle of his turn but Nellie and the side window may have blocked that shot. Slightly earlier in his turn a shot from the Old Red Courthouse or the county courts building on the north east side of Main and Huston would line up. Maybe a shot from the Records building would have worked very early around frame 235. -
Wounds Ballistics Tests Proved CE 399 Was Planted
Chris Bristow replied to Gil Jesus's topic in JFK Assassination Debate
Sometimes breaking boards with your hand can be a parlor trick. But five or more boards without spacers between them becomes very difficult. 95% of people who are of average size take 3 to 5 years of practice to break five boards. -
Wounds Ballistics Tests Proved CE 399 Was Planted
Chris Bristow replied to Gil Jesus's topic in JFK Assassination Debate
In that test with the pine wood they commented that the bullet left the muzzle at 2,080 ft per second. So we know they tested with a full load. The problem is they were so close to the wood that it impacted the wood at virtually full velocity. the fact that it struck the wood at full velocity but was not deformed by those first boards it struck proves without any doubt that the pine is not dense enough to deform the bullet EVEN AT FULL VELOCITY. They are testing to see if they can deform the bullet on a material that is not dense enough to deform the bullet even at full velocity. That's an unavoidable fact and completely nullifies their test. -
Yes there is a large margin. Connally's face sheet shows the entry 7.5 inches from the spine. Assuming J.C. was sitting 7 inches inboard of JFK the entry would be at the spine. So I assume we have to account for 7.5 inches of lateral movement for the bullet to line up with his entry wound. Testing a 30 rotation combined with a 10 degree rearward lean I find it only accounts for 4 inches of the 7.5 needed. But there are some unknowns I can't pin down. Usually we assume the limo aligned with the direction of the lane marker next to the limo. But if Greer was starting to point the limo towards the next set of marker he could be facing a degree or two left. Secondly, J.C. might have shifted slightly to his left as he positioned himself to turn around. Third, I have heard the distance between JFK's neck exit and J.C.'s entry as being either 30 or 36 inches. Both JFK and J.C. could have been 3 inches forward or backward at the moment of the shot. The 6 inch difference changes the entry by one inch. finally I don't know if J.C. was 6 or 7 or 8 inches inboard from JFK. These slight changes are near impossible to measure from the Z film. They could make a total difference of about 5 inches. The basic 30 degree turn gives 4 or 5 inches of the 7.5 inches needed. If J.C. was sitting more than 8 inches inboard and he shifted left a bit as he prepared to turn, and if the distance between JFK and J.C was 30 inches then the shot could feasibly line up. Including the limo direction there are 4 unknowns, 2 or 3 of them would be enough to make the shot possible. I don't personally buy the SBT but I think the trajectory may line up. Below are some overexposed frames of J.C. that show the coat pretty well. I think the entry location looks too close to the armpit and needs to go inboard about 2 inches.
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Here is the overhead view showing the lateral trajectory. J.C. turning to the right moves the entry wound to the left. Once you turn J.C to the right the trajectory through his chest has to be altered as seen by the blue lines in the diagram. The face sheet has his exit wound 2.5 inches closer to his center line than the entry, so assuming he was turned 20 degrees the bullet would have to deflect by 15 degrees through his chest. Then it would have to deflect another 40 degrees to go from the wrist to the thigh. I am not making a case for the SBT here, just measuring what it would take for a shot at fr223 to work. It is hard to just look at J.C in fr223 and measure his torso rotation. Measuring his head position is much easier and more accurate. He appears to be looking about 20 degrees to the right of Z's camera. Z's camera is at 42 degrees to the limo so J.C is looking about 62 degrees right of the limo. Then you can compare J.C's tie knot to the center line of his face or the bottom of his chin. He is looking about 30 degrees to the right of his tie knot/torso position. That means his torso was turned up to 30 degrees to the right. We know 3D models are only as good as the data they are based on. The only way to check the work is to do the basic math for slope angles and such. I would love to see the measurements the model is based on. Having all the relative heights and distances would allow for the best evaluation of the graphics created from those measurements. For anyone who uses the diagram below it has one serious problem. The width of the torso compared to the thickness is way off. The thickness of the torso has to be increased by 30%! I know it seem like a lot and when you correct it is looks weird. The thing is we hardly ever see the view from directly above. But comparing chest cavity dimension of anatomical drawings they consistently show the diagram to be way off. That is true whether you just compare rib cages or you add the shoulders. both separate comparisons show the thickness of the chest to be approx 30% too small. I have not made the correction in the diagram but in doing so the bullet travels a couple more inches laterally and exits almost 6 inches away from the official exit.
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The perspective of the lateral trajectory is seen looking down from above. The side view shows the vertical trajectory. I'm only talking about the lateral left to right trajectory of the bullet. My point was that Connally turning to his right moves the entrance wound several inches to the left. I think the 20° plus rotation needs to be added to the model. The only way the vertical trajectory works is if we accept JFK's entrance wound as being between C7 and T1, give or take an inch. If it was a T4 then it exits JFK's sternum and hits Connally too low.
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I thought it was generally agreed that Connally was turned approx 30 degrees to his right at 223 and maybe 20/25 degrees by 225? The 3D model shows him almost straight forward in his seat. Rotating J.C. 20 degrees moves the entry wound location about 2 to 3 inches to the left bringing it closer to aligning with the bullet trajectory. In addition having his torso turned partially towards Zapruder makes it hard to judge just how much he was leaning back because that movement is almost directly away from Z, so any amount of rearward lean can not be determined accurately. The 28 degree downward track through J.C. may indicate he was leaning back by 10 degrees(Or maybe the bullet deflected 10 degrees downward.). That would move the entry wound location to the left/rear, maybe 2 inches closer to aligning with the bullet trajectory. If his back was slightly hunched it would be unreadable from Z's position and would bring the alignment another 1 to 2 inches closer. On top of all that we can only estimate J.C.'s position to within maybe 1.5 inches from the Z film. We have to add at least that for JFK. I think at minimum there is a 1.5 inch tolerance due to Z's distance and film resolution of J.C.. Add another 2 inches because we can't tell if he was leaning back, and another 1.5 inch because his back could have been slightly hunched and there is a total of 5 inches of ambiguity. Once we rotate J.C. to 20 or 30 degrees and take the 5 inch ambiguity into account the trajectory appears to be possible.
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A THOUGHT ON THE LIMO STOP
Chris Bristow replied to Chris Bristow's topic in JFK Assassination Debate
I think the separate frames can still be downloaded at John Costella's JFK site. You can compare frames 315 and 317 which both have similar amounts of blur. Note the distance the limo travels in those two frames. The white trash on the grass goes from over Greer's head to above the crossbar. The limo itself is a good yardstick because we know it is 256 inches long including the rear foot holds. I think it is 248 without the footholds. It is easy to make an accurate measurement of how far the limo moved forward relative to the fixed trash on the ground. The limo traveled 16 to 18 inches from 315 to 317. At 8mph the limo advances 7.5 inches per frame so the limo has to doing 8+mph. I find sizing an image of the limo to 248 mm on the screen makes it very easy to measure separate sections of it because 1mm will = 1 inch. Although you need a photo taken from more than 30 feet and perpendicular to the limo to be non distorted. You can do the same thing with the HSCA drawing but here is a link to a good photo. https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Ffordauthority.com%2F2019%2F04%2Fkennedy-presidential-limo-replica-is-on-ebay%2F&psig=AOvVaw2NsEysndIHWKky7NWgia8Q&ust=1671340401357000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA8QjRxqFwoTCKj796ry__sCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAK